For his travel companions, Hannah Brehm probably seemed to be taking a late babymon in his third quarter.
But she and her husband had received an overwhelming diagnosis: her baby’s brain was not developing properly, turning her pregnancy sought. Medical experts warned that progress would probably mean that their child would only know pain and suffering. Minnesota’s couple I wasn’t going to take that opportunity.
Instead, they went to Colorado, where for decades the Boulder abortion clinic served as a resource for the women who were looking for Finish your pregnancies In the second or third quarter for medical reasons, such as Brehm or other circumstances.
After more than 50 years, that clinic closed silently last month, leaving the United States with just a handful that Offer abortions After 28 weeks in pregnancy, many case by case.
The founder of the 87 -year -old clinic, Dr. Warren Hern, says she is deeply upset: “It was impossible to continue, but the closure is one of the most painful decisions of my life.”
Defenders against abortion They have celebrated the closure, calling it a step forward in the protection of mothers and unborn children. While the The overwhelming majority of abortions take place in the first quarterAncient patients and reproductive rights defenders care about the impact of losing an already narrow resource.
“Most likely it does not happen to you. And I hope it does not happen to another person you love, but it is happening,” said Brehm, reflecting on his experience in 2022.
Federal data show that only 1% of abortions come after 21 weeks of pregnancy, but experts believe that this number is higher because some states, including California, do not give federal their abortion statistics.
The reasons for late abortions vary. Some diagnoses such as abnormalities of anatomy or genetic disorders cannot occur until after 20 weeks or later in pregnancy. It is possible that other women do not discover that they are pregnant until after the first quarter. Millions of women live in a state with a strict prohibition of abortion.
Sarah Watkins traveled from Georgia to the Boulder Clinic in 2019 just before 25 weeks after her pregnancy after learning that her baby had a condition called Trisomy 18, an additional chromosome that made the baby die in the uterus or shortly after birth. A genetic blood detection at 10 weeks before dismissed the possibilities of the condition, but a detailed ultrasound in the second trimester demonstrated otherwise.
“You can do everything right, for the book, but you still can’t discover certain things to that ultrasound at 20 weeks and sometimes even later,” he said. “And as a mother, I didn’t want me to feel a single moment of pain, suffering, pain or discomfort. That’s why I made the decision.”
Watkins described the medical care he received at the Hern attentive and affectionate clinic. However, he said that traveling to a place with multiple layers of bulletproof glass and a multitude of protesters was a traumatic experience.
For years, Hern was the only provider in the USA. Uu. In offering subsequent abortions, from 1973 and developing specialized techniques and even innovating certain tools to guarantee better health results. But offering abortions at the end of pregnancy had risks.
He and his medical team received constant death threats. Someone shot through the clinic windows five times in 1988. Five of Hern colleagues offered similar services They were killed throughout their careerincluding the murder in 2009 of Dr. George Tiller in Kansas.
When Hern announced the closing of the clinic at the end of April, the Anti-abortion group Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America declared the news as a “victory” in a publication on social networks.
Hern said the work was always worth it. He remembered one of his first patients who could not believe the cleaning of his operating room; He previously had an illegal abortion that left her humiliated and scared.
“She looked at me and said ‘please, never stop doing this,'” said Hern. “So I didn’t. Until now.”
In the end, financial problems made it almost impossible to operate the clinic. Hern said that patients were increasingly problems paying the procedure, which is around $ 10,000 is often not covered by insurance. Personal donors for a long time were also decreasing.
Hern worked with doctors over the decades, hoping that one day they would take care of their clinic, but that never worked.
“I had to make a decision really, you know, on the basis of the situation at the time we could not continue,” he said. “It was very, very painful. I see this as my personal failure.”
According to the subsequent abortion initiative by Ibis Reproductive Health, less than 20 clinics provide abortions after 24 weeks during pregnancy in the USA, although that number is not considered integral and excludes hospitals and a handful of other clinics for safety reasons.
Currently, the group lists three clinics, in New Mexico, Maryland and Washington, DC, which provide services after 28 weeks. Five others, in Maryland, New Jersey, New York, Oregon and the state of Washington, will consider patients depending on medical recommendations or fetal and maternal conditions.
“I think Dr. Hern has been the carrier of the torch of abortion leaders in pregnancy,” said Jane Armstrong, a license therapist in Texas that now helps Support families that have finished pregnancies For medical reasons. He finished his own pregnancy around 21 weeks in 2021.
“Who will pick up the mantle? We really need a new torch bearer at this time.”
A dozen states have abortion prohibitions at all stages of pregnancy and four more have prohibitions that participate after about six weeks. Abortion fund organizations, which help people organize and pay abortions, say that prohibitions mean a greater demand for subsequent abortions. When people travel, they often have been making appointments for longer, gather the necessary money and take a flight or drive hundreds of miles away.
“Every time a clinic closes, it impacts everyone and what kind of attention they provide,” said Anna Rupani, executive director of Fund Texas Choice.
Shortly after the highest court of the Nation overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022, an abortion clinic for all currencies was inaugurated in Maryland, an association between the average nursing of certified nursing Morgan Nuzzo and Dr. Diane Horvath, an ob-gyn that specializes in complex family planning.
They said they are concerned about many things when it comes to reproductive rights, including the Trump administration movement to reduce prosecutions against people accused of blocking access to abortion clinics and reproductive health centers. But they are also driven by the constant overwhelming amount of suppliers requests every time they publish a position, and said that the number of clinics that offer subsequent abortions have increased since ROE was overturned.
“This type of attention is still available,” said Hurth. “It is more rare than it was a couple of weeks ago, but we mean aloud and proud that our doors are still open and that there are still other open places.”
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Associated Press Geoff Mulvihill reporter contributed to this report.
